Don't Think
by Mah'alleinir
Summary: Howard Stark had never expected a child...He had never exactly wanted one. But when Maria had gotten pregnant, it had been more convenient for him to keep the child: He would need him someday, after all. And as the child grew, Howard learned to dislike him... But that never meant that he didn't love him. Short Fic, just something cute-ish.


** Just a quick short fic that popped up into my head while listening to music. Usually I'm really not a fan of Howard Stark, but I felt like doing something a little sweet with him and everything. **

_"Son I am not everything you thought that I would be... but every story I have told is part of me." _How I Go- by Yellowcard.

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At first he could only stare down a the baby. It was all he could do, simply stare at the small pink thing in Maria's arms, and watch. This was his heir... he had never wanted him, of course, but when one of his one night stands had gotten pregnant, well...

Well. Truthfully there was only reason he had kept the child: With his company, one day he knew he would need an heir, and it was just easier to keep the thing than to get rid of it... Still, he hadn't thought that it would feel like that. His heart beat faster as if it were trying to break itself when he looked for the first time at the boy and feel his eyes try to fill themselves with water, though he was quick to hide it before anyone else in the room could see. He had been a strong child, the doctor had said. Strong heart, good vitals...

When he had been born, he hadn't screamed or cried at first. That had been the only complication... the little guy had just refused to breath. His heart pumped his blood flowed and he was remarkably healthy, but his lungs hadn't figured out how to work. The doctors had tried CPR, even with it being as difficult as it was on someone so small, and still the boy hadn't inhaled. Howard had broken down at that point, and reached out to touch the boy, his child, for the first time, not wanting to have the child suffocate without knowing who his father was... And just like that, the boy had started to cry.

He'd taken that as a sign, that he was meant to have and love this child, to protect him and help him when he couldn't do a thing himself and the child would love him. And for the first three years of Anthony's life, he had. He had loved the boy completely, something he'd never been aware that he was capable of. He would take an hour or two off a day from searching for Captain America, or from building weapons to spend with him, reading to him, caring for him, imagining him growing up. He would put him to bed some nights, and feed him, bath him. He imagined that he'd grow to be like Steve Rogers, perfect, clever, strong, loyal, kind and patriotic. But most importantly, as someone who would never give up, someone who would take a bullet for what was right.

Rationally he knew that it was completely unfair to hold Tony up to such impossible standards, but that didn't change anything... He'd much rather the boy grow up to be more like the lost Captain than himself and he felt he had to make that very clear to the boy from the beginning. It was his job to mold Tony into the man he would one day be, after all, and he could think of no better mold to fit than that man. So, naturally, Tony grew up loving Captain America. He would read and re-read the stories on almost a daily basis, He would play with the toys, re-enact what he thought his battles had been like. He had adored the very thought of Cap. But as much as he worshiped the man, he was obviously not growing to be anything like him.

As they years went on, and Tony grew, Howard really wasn't sure if he loved the boy or hated him.

Sure, thankfully he was an absolute breeze to teach... He seemed able to learn anything from bathroom training to mechanics with ease. The boy picked it all up as if it were as simple and natural as breathing. And on one level, it made Howard extremely proud.

But on another level, his ability to just know things that had taken his father years to learn- that he had struggled with for endless, sleepless hours- that was the problem... He hated to admit it to anyone, even if only to himself, but he was jealous of his son. It made him sick, but he knew, deep down, that's what it was that boiled in his gut every time the boy figured something out and was able to recreate it on his own. He would, without a doubt, be smarter than Howard was by the age of twelve, and that was a huge feat, given that he himself had long been the most brilliant and well-known man in the country. It stung.

So he did the only thing he could think to do: He stopped spending so much time with the child, and he concentrated on his work more frantically, unwilling to decided what he felt towards his son, mostly because he was terrified he knew which of the two it was. He had hoped that Maria would give him the much-needed affection that he was unable to give him, but she was more interested in drinking than being near her child... some days, Howard wasn't even sure she remembered that she had a son.

Of course, he became too distracted too quickly to realize that she really didn't care until the boy was five. That was when he hired a butler to take care of the child, some man named Jarvis, who was so completely devoted that it almost made Howard jealous all over again. It wasn't fair that someone else was able to love his own child more than he was able to... But, Tony needed him, so he ignored his anger.

He didn't want to remember all of the things that he'd missed in Tony's life, the times that he hadn't been there for the boy when he should have been. When he went to school for the first time. When he was constantly getting into fights because of his sharp tongue and quick wit. For that, he'd just thrown money at the school to convince them not to suspend the boy, but he'd never spoken to him about it. He missed being there when Tony couldn't sleep for days on end, thinking himself into migraines, and he was never the one to see that Tony would eat anything throughout the day as a parent should have.

Only once did he ever remember hitting Tony.

He, of course, had been rather drunk, a habit which he had fallen into with such ease that it should have disturbed him. The boy had been six at the time, smart enough to build an engine on his own to try to impress his father. That had actually been the reason Howard had been drinking that night... Six. He was six... and jealousy about the whole thing had attacked Howard again, and he dove into the mind-numbing amber liquid that made dulled everything.

Tony had come into his lab, calmly, smiling up at his father, eyes begging for his approval. He had asked about a project Howard was working on... and something inside of him just snapped. He hadn't really realized he had struck the boy for a few moments until he saw the red welt forming on his rather stunned young face and felt the tingling sting spread across the back of his hand.

And Tony had not cried. Really, he hadn't even flinched. He had just given his father the coldest, most un-amused and betrayed stare before he turned, and exited the lab without another word. That was just about the last exchange between the two before his son's eyes just followed him silently every time they were in a room together.

When Howard had woken up the next morning, there were no words to describe how horribly he'd felt, both unimaginably ashamed of himself for losing his temper and more hung-over than he'd ever been. Still, he never said a word of apology to Tony and Tony hadn't said anything to him.

Despite everything, regardless of what it might outwardly look like, he did love his son. Nothing could change that...and it took a long while for him to admit that, long years after they'd spent any real time together, but he loved the boy as much as he hated him. He couldn't stand to be around him very long and still keep his temper, but he loved him.

He wished that he had the courage to tell the boy... but everything he had ever been taught by his own up-bringing went against directly telling him. He would never be able to get past that, and he was self-aware enough, even with all of his drinking, to know and understand that. He also knew that his son would grow up thinking that he disliked him, to put it mildly. It wasn't fair to Tony, but he couldn't bring himself to do anything about it now.

Which was why he was presently leaning on a table-top model of the Stark Expo with the camera angled towards him... this was really the only way he could think to show Tony - when the man was older and he was most likely long dead of liver or heart failure - how much he really did care.

He swirled the amber liquid that settled in his tumbler, the ice clinking pleasantly against the glass, and ignored the blinking red light that informed him that the tape was already recording... He didn't want to rush this. Not when, one day, it would be all that Tony would have left to remember him. One day, hopefully, he would be able to do what he hadn't been able to do in life. He would be able to change the world. He shook his head, and let his eyes drift up to meet the camera.

"Tony. You're too young to understand this right now... so I thought I'd put it on film for you."

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**Was a little more sad, I suppose, than I set out to make it, but it's good enough. Hope whoever reads it enjoys.**


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